


a god is as powerful as their name

by violetsonherlap



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Inspired by Daphne and Apollo (Ancient Greek Religion & Lore), M/M, atsumu as apollo, sakuatsu as a greek myth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-04
Updated: 2021-02-04
Packaged: 2021-03-16 02:22:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29199789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/violetsonherlap/pseuds/violetsonherlap
Summary: atsumu is still a god but has been cursed to become forgotten. a mention of his name to mortals could cause them pain. he once pursued someone that cost him a lot. not caring for anything now—he repeatedly visits the love of his life at a bookshop and he encounters a child.
Relationships: Miya Atsumu/Sakusa Kiyoomi
Comments: 4
Kudos: 19





	a god is as powerful as their name

**Author's Note:**

  * For [auroramyths](https://archiveofourown.org/users/auroramyths/gifts).



> so acads has been really hard and i wrote this after a breakdown so please forgive me for the shortcomings. ive had a thought about sakuatsu as apollo x daphne. i hope you enjoy reading and take care! ilysm <3

Why do humans crave progress? Why do we have to keep on moving? Why can’t we just stay on one place and be still. Why do we have to go from point A to point B? What is in point B and why must we risk everything to reach it? Why can’t we just stay at point A? Why are we so hooked on not being stuck? Do we really have to get better? _Can we not savor feelings of despair or sadness? After all, it is emotions that makes us human_.

I kept racking my head for answers and I realized it is because we are threatened with our _mortality_. The Gods does not change because they have eternity but us humans we have to make something out of our lives because _we are only granted so little of the infinite years that the Gods can live up to._

“Oh, you are up?”My grandma saw me descending down the stairs and looked in disbelief. I wake up early and only go down late so she was surprised as to why I was early. I was confused with myself as to why I went down too. I should be reading a book by this time. When I am near enough and did not make out an answer, she gently handed me the tray and pointed the garden. _So he is here again? Him. He seems like a fleeting dream. He feels so real when he is here and yet his trace vanishes the moment he leaves._

He always has the same order of tea for this particular day and wore the same outfit. He has some few requests and always gave out a tremendous amount of payment for such simple things. 

One. That he stay at the garden of the bookshop where the trees and flowers are blooming with their full beauty.

Two. That my grandma make his tea and I serve it to him without looking at him. A rule that I’ve always broken yet he doesn’t really care about now.

Three. Do not let outsiders into the garden as long as he is there and we let him be for the night.

He is usually gone before we wake in the morning. I cannot remember anything about my childhood other than the man who has always visited our bookshop. I wasn’t allowed to go outside that much since my grandma is also busy with managing the bookshop so I had to be where she can see me. The man seems to be frozen in time—looking the same as when I was a child and even now that i am a young adult. My earliest memories were of this place—giving my grandma a headache because of my high energy as a child. I’ve become more quiet and reserved as I grew up. We usually serve a bit of food on the menu but we specialize more on drinks and of course classic books.

I made my way carefully to the garden hoping to not break the anything I’m carrying. Honestly our place is not that big and the back part of the shop which is a garden is usually rented for date nights by couples because of the intimate vibe that it gives off. So I have always wondered why this same man is drinking tea alone here. Despite the chair that we gave him, he was sitting on a silk cloth that he laid on the exposed roots of the tree and just sat there, his back leaning completely on the trunk. His eyes is shut off and his face seems relaxed. He carried no belongings with him other than an instrument that has been carefully wrapped. He is a huge man—a little over six feet for sure with tan skin.

I was told when I was younger to not look at his face by my grandma or not to talk to him but I was used to bothering people when I was a kid since I have no one to play with. My grandma made me apologize but he just laughed it off.

“Go easy on the child.” He also called my grandma on her first name despite looking really young. “It’s alright. I’m one of the lesser now I guess.” This was the specific conversation that they’ve had back then.

I placed his requests on the table gently and also lowered my gaze before him, I pause slightly on my tracks. The tea will get cold but how will I wake him...so I decided to stop on my tracks and think a little bit. As if he knew my struggle, his eyelids fluttered open revealing the brown eyes that complemented his golden hair and dark brows.

“You’ve grown quite well.” A lazy smile draped on his face. He freed the instrument from the cloth that has wrapped it close.

“Yes, your grace.” I bowed before him. To which he had a look of disapproval.

“Atsumu...call me Atsumu.” The mention of his name has brought a flooding gush of memories which has brought me grief and sadness. I held onto the table tightly so I won’t fall.

“I’ve underestimated the curse that I have.” He looked away but the tears on his eyes and the shakiness in his voice gave him away. He is not numb from all of these. When will he be? A god is as powerful as his name is. If you are forgotten then what power do you have?

_You see when I was a child—I have grown quiet attached to this one tree at the garden and would fight with the man in front of me.“This tree is mine so what do you mean you want to be with this tree alone!” I would hit him with my tiny fist and he would play along with me._

_“Then can we share this tree?” He would bribe me with music that he would play from his instruments. I would fall asleep on the tree laying on the cloth that he would bring and then when I woke up—I would be in my bed upstairs._

_Everything seemed like a dream because by then he would have left. One time he asked me if I would like a story and I nodded. “Well, there was a god—“ I interrupted him immediately with my thoughts “What do Gods look like gold man?” A nickname that I used to call him because he always seemed golden to me._

_“How do I look? You answer me.” Then he shifted the topic back to the story that he was telling before I could process my thoughts._

_“ Well that one god thought he was all powerful so he can get everything that he wanted. He was selfish and conceited. So he made Cupid angry and so one time, there was a person that he pursued so much but that person did not love him back. The person loathed this selfish god so much he asked to be a tree so he can be spared.”_

“ _Then gold man does this tree love that God?” I blurted my thoughts innocently and tapped the tree that we were leaning on. I remember how sullen his face has become—how it has so much emotions. Of anger, grief, and most of all: of pain. He just painfully smiled.“Should we continue on another day?” He told me that he suddenly felt unwell._

_That was the only day that he left so early so I understood that I should ask only a bit of questions while he was telling stories. The next day he continued where we left off and I asked him of what this person looked like.“He had two moles that looked like constellations and he always covers the lower part of his face even when he was so beautiful. No night could compare to the beauty of his dark wavy hair...”_

_“Well why didn’t this beautiful man love the god?”_

_“That’s what I want to know too...” Pain is evident on his voice and as a child I didn’t understand that much._

I suddenly came back to my senses. “Do you still love him? Even after everything...” I figured I would ask him now that I am an adult. The answer is obvious but I just want to hear it for reasons I do not know. 

”Always.” 

  
I realized that if we humans have to keep moving because of the short lives that we have and if the gods have an eternity to spend to—do their feelings of sadness and suffering also tend to last forever, too? Because if the answer is yes, then how horrible must it be to not be loved in such a long long period of time. 


End file.
